Improvement in artificial honey-combs



A. B. LAW'THER. Artificial Honey-Comb.

No. 200,549. Patented Feb. 19 1878;

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UNITED STATES PATENT OEEIcE.

ALFRED B. LAWTHER, OF CHICAGO, ILLINOIS.

IMPROVEMENT IN ARTIFICIAL HONEY-COMBS.

Specification forming part of Letters Patent No. 200,549, dated February19, 1878; application filed October 29, 1877.

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, ALFRED B. LAWTHER, of the city of Chicago, county ofCook, and State of Illinois, have invented a new and useful Improvementin Artificial Honey-Combs, of which the following is a specification:

The object of my invention is to provide combs of suitable form andmaterial, ready made, for honey-bees to store their honey in, thussaving them the labor of preparing the wax and constructing combs in theusual manner, thereby greatly increasing their power to gather honey, itbeing estimated by those experienced in the management and care of beesthat the production of one pound of wax requires an amount of time andlabor on the part of the bees that would suffice to gather twenty poundsof honey.

A further advantage arising from my invention is that combs, constructedaccordingly can be filled and emptied repeatedly without breaking, thehoney being extracted by means of a centrifugal machine, as is commonlydone with other honey-combs, when it is desired to use them the secondtime.

In constructing my improved honey-comb I use, by preference,fourprincipal parts, viz:

first, an open frame of wood, made up of two similar but narrowerframes; second, a web or plate of paper, cloth, or any suitable materialinterposed between the two halves of the frame; third, cells composed ofpaper, cloth, or similar material arranged within the frame and restingon the web or plate, which thus becomes the bottom for all the cells incommon; fourth, a coating of bees-wax applied to the surfaces of thecells, web, and frame to cement them together, and to render thesurfaces similar to the surfaces of a natural honeycomb. This coatingcan be applied in a melted state, and any excess can be thrown off by acentrifugal machine.

For convenience in making the artificial comb, the cells, web, and framecan be glued or cemented together before applying the wax coating, carebeing taken to use such glue or cement as would not dissolve in meltedwax.

The above described I prefer, though various modifications are possible.Thus the web could be dispensed with, and each cell could be made with abottom instead of open, the union of these bottoms of the, double row ofcells forming a substitute for the web. The

frame could also be dispensed with, and the requisite strength obtainedby making the web and cells of extra thickness, &c. Therefore I do notconfine myself to any exact form of construction;

Having thus given a general description of my invention, I- will proceedto give a detailed description.

Referring to the drawings, Figure 1 is a plan of the cells and frame.Fig. 2 is a section at .10 as, Fig. 1, showing the frames A A, web B,and cells C. Fig. 3 is a view of the cells C on a larger scale, beforethey are joined together. Fig. 4is aplan of cells constructed of acontinuous plate or sheet, corrugated in such aform that when two ormore are joined together the cells will be complete. Fig. 5 is a sectionof the same form, showing also the web B to which the edges of thecorrugated plates are secured.

In constructing a honey-comb according to the form of my invention Imost prefer, I first make the frames A A, then secure the web B betweenthem by glue. The cells C are then made by forming up strips of strongpaper, the width of the paper being the depth of the completed cell,into either circular or nearly hexagonal pipes, glue being used tosecure the edges of the paper. After the glue has hardened, the pipe orcell is pressed in a die or mold to give it a truly hexagonal form, whenI secure it by one end by glue to the web B in its proper position.After the frame A is filled with cells, melted wax is poured into thecells and immediately poured out, except such coating as may adhere tothe surfaces. Should this be excessive, a centrifugal machine can beused to remove all excess.

Having thus described my invention, what .I claim, and wish to secure byLetters Patent, is

1. An artificial honey-comb constructed of fibrous materials, asdescribed.

2. An artificial honey-comb formed of fibrous material and coated withwax, substantially as specified.

3. The combination of the frames AA, web

B, and artificial cells C, formed substantially as described.

ALFRED B. LAWTHER. Witnesses:

H. R. VAN'DERVOR, ARCHELAUS PUGH.

